


The Grasp of Mortality

by failsafe



Category: Doctor Who, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Crossover, Gen, Multi, Multiple Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-03
Updated: 2017-10-03
Packaged: 2019-01-08 11:50:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12253848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/failsafe/pseuds/failsafe
Summary: Alive forever. Dead indefinitely. Or somewhere in-between.





	The Grasp of Mortality

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Gray Cardinal (Gray_Cardinal)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gray_Cardinal/gifts).



> I hope you enjoy your fic! It changed so many times as I was writing it. Originally, it was going to be about Cybermen. Spoiler alert: It is not about Cybermen. The outline I had was so long that I had to whittle it down into something that felt, more or less, like a first episode of a crossover season to me. I looked for a tag that reflected that, but that is basically the intent here. Daniel/Sha're is explicitly included, but other shippy vibes might be found here and there if you want. I look forward to your impressions, but more than anything i just hope you like it.

 

The life Daniel Jackson had begun to lead felt almost like one he knew how to live. Those first days back on Earth had been dizzying, terrible. He had been a stranger in a strange land, never mind where he had just been. The weight of reverse culture shock was a risk that anyone whose work or life led them to an entirely new place and back _home_ again. The central heating and cooling in his Colorado apartment had been oppressive. No matter the time of year, his bed had been empty and cold. After a while, he had started coming home so tired that it didn't matter anymore. 

He went to the supermarket and occasionally to drive-thrus. He became reacquainted with things like Coca-Cola, peanut butter, and 99-cent cheeseburgers. They were, at first, too rich and thick for his palate. Then, they were tasteless and normal. Finally, he had started to find a few things he actually  _liked_ again. And therein lay the problem. 

Guilt, or the lack thereof. He always felt caught between the two, and the further to the back of his mind the constant pendulum swing went, the more it rattled him when it came back into sharp focus and reality. Sometimes, when they went through the 'Gate, either to return to the SGC or to arrive on some new world, he had to stand very still and breathe very deeply to stop himself being sick. If asked, he might have said it was Gate-lag. If he were to try and tell the truth, he might have come up with something more like: his wife was out there, out here, somewhere, and he had just realized he had stepped through the 'Gate without looking for her hard enough, as the first thing, as the _only_ thing. What kind of husband was he?

Sometimes, he didn't have time to think about it. Then, he did, and the cycle started all over again – a puzzle, still without a solution, and he couldn't ask the person at its center when he most needed her advice.

\- - -

“Oh, that is beautiful. And a little bit freaky,” one young woman said to another. The woman who spoke wore a waitress's uniform, a short dress in bright blue and clean, perfect white. She had a spring in her step, much like that of a child gleefully giving herself permission to put off a chore just a little bit longer.

The woman who followed behind her looked less enthusiastic about the find. The ghost of a smile lingered on her lips as she watched her companion. She secured her arms across her chest as if in some defiance of the warm, dry humor in her tone.

“Really,” she said, “And which of us is beautiful and which of us is 'freaky'?”

This earned her glance over the apparent waitress's shoulder and a roll of said waitress's eyes. Then, she was being ignored again.

The young woman, who was not actually a waitress by occupation, turned her attention back to the irregular, stony frame around the mirror. She reached out to touch it, dragging her fingertips along its rough frame. She was making a face of deep concentration at it, lips pressed into a line that rendered her silent.

Her companion, dressed in a bit of leather and otherwise more rugged attire, trudged to her side, regarding her expression.

“I will take your silence as an answer to my question,” the woman announced. She appeared to be the younger of the two, but she sighed a long-suffering sigh just the same.

“Oh, stop it. I'm trying to think,” came the reply.

“Why bother,” the younger woman said, picking at an imaginary imperfection and soiling of her leather jacket.

“Why wouldn't you. Don't tell me: you've been here before?”

“Not once. A certain man I knew once, called Jack, told me it wasn't worth the trip. The Slow Path, remember? I could only manage to be one place at one time, and at the time, he more than kept us busy.”

“Had a good time, then?”

“Not that kind of busy, but I was enjoying myself... some of the time.”

As they chatted, she took an interest in the other contents of the room. She had already spent quite enough time in her long, long life looking into her own reflection. She could wait. She touched other things, though, picking them up to examine them. She wondered if she had ever come upon them before, only to forget them. But how could she know what she had forgotten?

“The things I've heard about him, I'm surprised.”

“About the enjoyment or the fact that it only happened some of the time?”

“I think I'll choose not to answer that question,” the woman said, brushing her fingertip against the reflective surface of the mirror before drawing it back and examining the spot left behind. Or the lack of one. “Hmm,” she hummed. “Doesn't smudge.”

“Careful. You'll put your fingerprints on it.”

“Good luck explaining those,” she said, to no one in particular. After all, how could the American military explain the presence of the fingerprint of someone who, at the moment, was an English little girl on this strange artifact? “Although I'd like it better if we could explain the presence of a poorly-beveled mirror at Area 51.”

“Some things are inexplicable,” the one in leather sighed. She reached up and ran her fingers back from her hairline, massaging her scalp and her already voluminous, mussed hair.

“Rarely, given enough time.”

“What's the point? I'm afraid I'm already getting a bit bored,” she said, reached down into a nearby box as she rejoined her friend. Her fingers brushed over something that gave her tactile feedback that wasn't simple cardboard or familiar steel. She watched her companion give her a look of certain, practiced disappointment. Then, she watched her reach out to try her flattened hand against the mirror. And finally, she watched as she blinked and, in a moment, her companion disappeared.

“Clara?” the woman, known only by the self-chosen title, pronoun, and moniker Me, asked. When she looked left and right and received no response, she sighed and regarded the mirror with contempt. She knew what to do, before the sound of her unrestrained voice or anything else about their excursion here drew attention and drew them away from access back to their TARDIS. “It had to be one of these,” she sighed. Then, her hand pressed flat to the surface of the mirror, too.

Only a second later, the nondescript storeroom filled with items that quite bore description stood empty.

\- - -

The Quantum Mirror existed across many worlds, many variants of the same culture. It had a funny way of perpetuating itself, but its control device proved quite perplexing to the less-advanced species who came across it. However, the Quantum Mirror had its own methods of maintaining its network. For instance, it had the default function of choosing the alternate reality to which it was connected which was most-similar to the one the user had left. In the case of Daniel Jackson's passage from one reality to the other, this connection lay in the circumstances in which he would find his home planet so very soon. In this case – in the case of Clara Oswald and Me – the Quantum Mirror which they found called out to its sister in a reality in which she was also stored on Earth, in the United States of America, at Area 51.

\- - -

“That was weird,” Clara was saying when Me saw her again. She glanced over at her, meeting her eyes. “I touched it and for a second you were gone.”

“It was you,” Me informed her. “I believe this is a device which transitions those who touch it between similar alternate realities,” she explained.

Clara raised her eyebrows.

“Well, look at you.”

“I've seen many things, including the human tendency to possess technology they haven't the faintest idea what to do with.”

Clara rolled her eyes.

“I've done quite a bit of that too.”

“But not for billions of years.”

“It doesn't make sense, though,” Clara said. She looked around the mirror, at its back and at the surface it rested upon. “I touched it before.”

“Not without this,” Me said, reaching down into the same general area where she had found the control device that her fingers must have brushed across. Reaching down into an only slightly-different, nondescript cardboard box, her eyes widened. She felt a little prick of nervousness in her chest as she glanced at Clara. Clara met her eyes and knew her well enough by this point to recognize worry in them.

“What is it?” Clara asked, already sounding weary.

“Well, I'm sure it's around here somewhere,” Me said, a bright, sharp, cavalier smile gracing her lips. It was even mostly genuine.

\- - -

The morning was uncomfortably warm and humid from the first moment Jack stepped foot outside. By the time he reached Cheyenne Mountain and got through security, he was relieved to be in the cool, dark halls. He made his way down through the mountain to the SGC. When he entered the briefing room, he was in a decent mood. He took a seat next to Daniel, whom he noticed did not seem to be in a very good mood. He looked over at him, but Daniel just kept pressing his temple into a loosely curled fist.

Jack opened his mouth to speak, but he didn't say anything yet. The door opened, and he was prepared to stand for General Hammond, a reflex at this point. He'd cover for Daniel's hangover or whatever it was.

As it turned out, it was Teal'c who walked through the door.

“'Morning, Teal'c,” Jack said warmly, hoping it would be contagious. It was often enough that his bad moods were, and wherever they were going today, the weather was probably better.

“It is, O'Neill,” Teal'c responded with a bemused hint of a smile. He took his seat at the far end of the table, opposite where Hammond would sit.

“Yeah,” Jack said, squinting a little. He couldn't tell if he needed to explain that greeting, again. He glanced over at Daniel who still looked hardly awake. Daniel reached out for a cup of coffee and brought it to his lips, taking a few deep swallows that seemed pretty mechanical. He still didn't say a word or look up at either of them. Jack considered asking him whether he'd had a rough night, but he didn't know how it'd be received.

When General Hammond came through the door, he was accompanied by Captain Carter. She was talking to him, gesturing a little in front of herself as she walked. Then, when they were fully in the room, she took her place at the table and stood at attention with Jack and Teal'c until General Hammond quickly motioned for them to have a seat. All the while, Daniel had just barely inclined his head to look at General Hammond and give a quick, very civilian kind of respectful, barely there nod.

As he moved to take his seat again, Jack reached out and just barely touched the top of Daniel's head, fingers brushing against his short-cut hair.

“Perk up,” he advised in a low tone, adding a nudge of his elbow into Daniel's side as he settled.

“I'm perky,” Daniel said, his voice sounding a little cracked from disuse.

General Hammond cleared his throat, consulted his notes, and started to launch into the briefing when there was another interruption. There were a few quick raps at the door.

“Come,” General Hammond ordered.

“General Hammond, sir,” a young woman who came through the door said, “I'm sorry to interrupt.”

“What is it?” Hammond asked in a reassuringly dismissive tone.

“Area 51, sir. There's been a security breach,” she explained.

Jack looked at the young woman, just waiting to be made angry about some kind of NID meddling – or worse – again. He bristled without even hearing the end of it.

“Yes? And what about it concerns us?” Hammond pursued.

“I'm not sure, sir. Apparently there's... concern about causing an international incident. They want to bring the... detainees... here, sir.”

“I see,” Hammond said. He nodded at her, stood, and then looked one to the other at the members of SG-1. “If you'll excuse me, I'm afraid we'll have to postpone your briefing. Dismissed, but stay on site.”

“Yes, sir,” Captain Carter said first. Apparently, she was eager to find out what was happening and moved to join her young colleague, asking her a question softly.

“General,” Jack said, drawing Hammond's attention back, “you know we haven't had the best experiences with NID and those stationed at Area 51.”

“I do, but we can't go making assumptions.”

“I'm just recommending caution, General.”

“Noted,” Hammond said. “Dismissed,” he repeated.

When Jack glanced down at Daniel, he saw him brace his arms against the arms of the chair and start to stand. When they were alone for a second, Jack lingered and waited until he could meet Daniel's eyes.

“What's going on?” he asked him, directly now that it wouldn't be embarrassing him.

“I just didn't sleep well,” Daniel answered curtly. He started to move to follow the others, to disperse to his work space until they were calle back.

Jack followed by a few steps and reached out for his arm to slow him down.

Daniel looked back when Jack touched his arm, fingers just barely catching at his elbow for a moment. He cleared his throat softly.

“Yeah, I just... wanted you to know. If it ever gets... tough, you're still always welcome at my place,” he said. That first night Daniel had spent back on Earth and a few after it, he had stayed with Jack. When he had moved out into his own place, things had started to seem almost normal, but something in Jack's gut told him why Daniel might not be sleeping.

Daniel stared at him, almost as if he might be offended at the suggestion. After considering it, though, he smiled.

“Yeah, thanks.” He paused, staring at Jack's eyes before he pocketed his hands and started to walk away. “I'm just gonna... go see if I can get some work done.”

Jack cleared his throat a little loudly.

“Yeah, no problem.”

\- - -

Hours passed, and at last there was a bustle as two 'guests' were brought into the mountain. They were under guard, but they were not bound in any way when they reached the sub-level of the SGC. By the time they arrived, the shudders and blinds between the briefing room and the Stargate had been closed.

Word filtered through the facility quickly. Someone came to get Daniel from his workspace where he was tinkering with an artifact he had been working on, translating the inscription. He sighed and left it behind, trudging back to the briefing room slowly.

With the unusually heavy, difficult morning he had been having, he narrowly missed the guard which brought the Mountain's two guests to the briefing room. He cleared his throat and excused himself as a couple of men with holstered weapons shuffled past him. As he stepped through and found his seat beside Jack, he was surprised to find that all of the bustling, loud interruption to the morning had been for two people.

“Hi,” he said, not quite a question for the two women. He leaned forward against his elbows to get a look at Hammond, curiously.

“Dr. Jackson,” General Hammond said. “SG-1,” he added, “these are Clara Oswald and... Me. Ms. Oswald claims affiliation with a United Nations initiative no one in the United States has ever heard of. You can imagine the... difficulty sorting out this claim,” he said, looking at the young woman, who appeared to be wearing a sort of bright blue Halloween costume of a 50s waitress. “But she knows enough that it seems credible that she has some knowledge of star-travel. Therefore, when she and her... friend here turned up at Area 51, it was negotiated to bring them here rather than to an alternative holding facility.”

“'Holding facility,'” the one called 'Me,' echoed. “So we are prisoners,” she said, apparently amused as she nudged her companion lightly in the arm. Ms. Oswald gave Me a cooling look.

“We intend to treat you with the utmost dignity that we can, but the fact of the matter is, you entered a restricted area with little to no trace of how you got there. If it's technology you used, we need to confirm that it is not of a hostile origin.”

Clara reached out and fidgeted her thumb against her fingertip as she rested her hand on the table. She stared at the motion for a moment before she offered something, glancing at each of the people who were strangers to her at the table.

“It's of extraterrestrial origin,” she explained softly, succinctly.

“... What's of extraterrestrial origin?” Daniel asked, whether it was his turn or not. The way she had said it – so calm – made him equal parts curious and anxious.

“The way we got to Area 51 was of extraterrestrial origin,” she repeated, for all of them. “However, there's more to it than that.”

“The Quantum Mirror,” Sam interjected.

Clara seemed to be taken aback by the name, judging by her face. Me gave her what Daniel might have called a subtle, guilty glance. Then they were both watching Sam.

“... The Quantum Mirror is what we call it,” Sam corrected. “Did you have a different name?”

Clara quickly shrugged with one of her shoulders.

“Don't know,” she said.

“We're aware that it likely is a device to transfer its users between alternate realities, or universes, or dimensions,” Me rattled off, sighing as if it all bored her just a little. “We were exploring, but we were unable to find the control device in the exact corresponding place to where it had been in our reality. This delay led to your security forces finding us before we found our way out. End of story.”

“I don't know that it is,” Hammond said, visibly bristling at the dismissive, quick tone of the young woman.

“With all due respect,” Me said, as if very little was due, “there was no grand plan to invade your facility. But while we're here, perhaps you could tell us what it is you do at this facility.”

“Me,” Clara chided very softly.

“They brought us here.”

“... Yes,” Daniel said, cautiously, “about that,” he said, looking past Jack and his eyes to General Hammond and Sam.

“We brought them here because Ms. Oswald started rattling off knowledge that no one who was... uninitiated has any right to have,” General Hammond explained.

“We were hoping that you might be able to tell us what this... UNIT sent you to do,” Sam said.

Clara smiled a strange smile before looking at her.

“Nothing really,” she said. “We're just out exploring. I promise we meant no harm. It's just... it's Area 51, and I never got to go before, so.”

“Before?” Jack echoed. He raised his eyebrows and gave her that doubtful, not entirely friendly look he often gave guests he wasn't sure about.

“On my other travels,” Clara said flippantly.

“About our question,” Me said. “The way I see it, you have little reason not to tell us. Either we are going to leave here allies or prisoners or some uneasy status between. We might as well know what it is you expect we might be affiliated with that would be a problem for you.”

Daniel couldn't quite be sure why he chose to blurt it out. Maybe it was because he was a civilian. Maybe it was because she seemed so wise and cool beyond her years. He didn't have the immediate sense that she was sadistic or evil, but as someone who had himself been influenced by the Sarcophagus one too many times, actually a few too many times, he was wary.

“The Goa'uld,” he blurted.

It earned him a look from Jack, Sam, and Hammond. There was at least a questioning expression on Teal'c's face too. Another interesting thing was that he had been at the meeting before any questions had been asked, but that could be dealt with later.

“The who?” Clara asked, eyebrows showing some genuine form of surprise. Maybe that hadn't been the right answer.

“If... you don't know, then maybe I'm not allowed to answer,” he said with at least a little caution.

“Well, cat's already out of the bag, Daniel,” Jack replied a little shortly.

When Hammond didn't immediately interject, Daniel took that as permission enough. He launched into an explanation that included a very abridged and redacted version of their first encounter with Ra from his very civilian point of view. He didn't even talk about Sha're right now. These were strangers, an he couldn't reduce her to a footnote.

“... Essentially,” he concluded, “they are parasitic beings who attach themselves to the nervous systems of other sapient creatures, like humans. They control the host through this connection, leaving the host a prisoner in their own body. It's... not great.” He couldn't help that his eyes lingered on Me for a moment as he added: “With the help of an alien device, the Goa'uld artificially restore and maintain the lives of themselves and their hosts... indefinitely.”

Me raised her eyebrows when she caught Daniel's eyes.

“Oh, so you've noticed,” she said. She considered him with a cool, astute gaze. Then, she smiled a crooked, subtle smile. She folded her hands, lacing fingers together in front of her. “But no,” she said. “The only parasite in my body is a piece of alien technology. Not another creature,” she said, as if it were nothing. It seemed, to her, it had become so.

“Does it... influence behavior?” Sam asked softly, trying to find a delicate way to segue into the subject.

“Only indirectly,” Me sighed.

“What does _that_ mean?” Jack complained.

“I think... Me means that an extended lifespan for any human, after a certain point, has a certain effect on the mind of someone who was... only ever... _'meant'_ to be mortal,” Clara offered as she leaned against the table. She kicked a foot beneath it, creating a little sound, as she looked across at Jack, tiredly hoping she had convinced him.

“And what about you? Are you... like her?” Jack asked with less than polite, evident suspicion.

“No, but...” Clara said. She looked up at Hammond, then at Sam, and she seemed to know that they would be the ones to consult. “Do you have an infirmary on site?”

“Of course,” Sam offered immediately.

“Why? Are you unwell, ma'am?” General Hammond asked.

Clara shook her head.

“No,” she said quickly. Then she made a furrowed, concerned face to herself for a moment. “Well. I'd... like to be seen by someone in your infirmary, and for at least one of you to come with me. I'd... like to explain something before we continue and you discover it on your own.”

“I'll go,” Daniel offered.

“As will I,” Teal'c said, and Daniel knew that tone. It was difficult to read Teal'c's tone of voice, until you had known him for a while. Daniel had known him for a while, and that tone meant that Teal'c was concerned Daniel was taken with something he shouldn't be. Moth to a flame, whether or not Teal'c knew the expression.

When they reached the infirmary and Clara had hopped up on the table, kicking her legs as if she were nervous, Dr. Fraiser finally approached them.

“Hello, Ms. Oswald,” Janet said, introducing herself, “I'm Dr. Fraiser.”

“Hello. Now... before you take that stethoscope and have a heart attack yourself,” Clara explained, “I need to tell you something.”

“Yes?” Janet asked. Her brow furrowed a bit. “What is it?”

“Everything about me looks alive, feels alive. I feel fine,” Clara promised, “but... I don't have a heartbeat.”

The murmur of confusion, disbelief, that drifted through the infirmary hit Daniel quietly. He just watched Clara's face and tried to take in what she had just said. There was something about it that bothered him, deeply. How could she be here? Alive, but not alive. And why did it seem so much like twisted, leading-down-a-darkened-path-he-had-seen-before hope?

Dr. Fraiser took things in stride, and she examined Clara discreetly. Clara didn't seem to mind the small audience as Janet searched her chest, her back, and her pressure points for any sign of a pulse. Finally, the silence broke.

“Since you already knew about this, I take it you know why you're...?” Janet asked, trailing off.

“Alive?” Clara asked, eyebrows raised. “I'm not, really. I'm... stuck... in a moment between life and death. But it's okay. You won't break me. Nothing will. Until I return to... a certain place where they can fix me up and send me on my merry way, nothing can. At least as far as I know.”

“You're immortal?” Daniel couldn't help himself asking.

“No,” Clara corrected softly, smiling a knowing, pitying smile that crawled up his spine. She hopped off the hospital bed and stood in front of him, looking up to meet his eyes, and turning away before it seemed too prying. “I'm already dead. It... is the result of someone who loved me – once – who... could not let me go.”

Me, from the corner of the room, made a sound that seemed quite rudely, quite inappropriately, like an amused scoff. Clara shot her a look, but that was where it ended.

“He's gone now. Not here,” she promised, “but he... gave me a gift. Bit of a gag gift really, but I'm making the best of it. I can give you more information as we go, but seeing as we're stuck here for now, I'm going to have to insist on some _quid pro quo_ , just as a matter of personal security for Me and myself,” she said, as if it were the most normal phrase in the world and a demand she was used to making.

\- - -

Deep beneath a depth of water the likes of which she has never seen on her planet, Sha're was awake. She saw through her own eyes, felt through her own body, but all of it seemed to come from beneath a deep, heavy layer that kept her from moving. She was reminded of fevers she had experienced – fevers she had survived – but this one was without end. The short respite with her father and her people, the even shorter one with her husband, while the demon took its leave to allow the child to mature made he her all the more aware of how bound she was and all the more aware of what happened in spite of her.

A part of her wanted to consider it a victory. At times, it felt that she could influence the demon now. The creature was cold in its heart and mind, but there were certain points where its consciousness seemed a little closer, a little more within her reach, since the child was born.

Sha're had never reached the moment when she might have imagined the child she might one day have with her husband. This child represented as much pain and betrayal as any child could, but he was still a child – a child she had grown to care for, if only to think to save it from what Apophis intended for it. She could wonder now, at times, if Amaunet had come to hold at least that might in common with her. Without Apophis to take the child as a host, it seemed that the demon's intentions for the child might have also changed, might have become something Sha're could almost recognize, even if she refused to soften her opinion of the demon itself.

When the demon chose to allow Sha're to sleep – usually within the dim, echoing depths of the sarcophagus – she could bear witness to her dreams. Then, slowly, she sometimes found that she could join with them. The demon was dismissive, threatening, frightening, but when Sha're found that she could do this, she decided she would not give up.

“How many times will you refuse the peace of surrender?” Amaunet asked her when they were side-by-side, but not quite equal. Every time, Sha're tried to reach such a height in her own mind, her own body, but so far it had not worked.

“I will always refuse false peace from a false god,” Sha're replied viciously. Sometimes, she could still imagine what it felt like to be in command of her own body. She could imagine showing her teeth.

“False or true, it does not matter if we are gods to your kind,” Amaunet replied.

“I do not care,” Sha're insisted. She considered her options, considered what she had observed, what she knew. She knew what might be the only power she had here. “The child,” she said.

“Is none of your concern, as this vessel is no longer you concern. Sleep, human,” Amaunet demanded.

Sha're felt dizzy, though she did not know how it was possible to be dizzy here, in the depths of their minds, wherever they were.

“No!” she insisted. “No, I will ask you what you will for the child.”

“What I will?” Amaunet asked. The demon was intrigued. The pressure on Sha're's mind eased, a little, and she felt less like she could no longer fight deep, dark sleep.

“Yes,” Sha're answered. “The child. He is hidden away from you, but he is now of no use as a host for your... your mate,” she said. It disgusted her, but it was truth.

“The child is still a danger and in danger without Apophis,” Amaunet replied, a kind of indifferent, toneless transfer of information.

“How?” Sha're pressed.

“Never mind, human. Sleep,” Amaunet said, but it was with less force now.

“No,” she insisted. “No, I must...”

“Your struggle is over. You must sleep,” Amaunet said. “The more you fight it, the more pain I can inflict.”

And for a while, so much that Sha're's sleeping form seeped sweat and tears within the sarcophagus, the demon proved it. When at last it ebbed away, Sha're was still clinging, still fighting for consciousness, and the demon seemed to have tired itself.

“I am still here,” Sha're snarled.

“And here you are... alone... without your mate, as am I,” Amaunet taunted, but perhaps there was a twisted kind of harmony between them for a moment.

“No,” Sha're said, “he will come for me, and I will fight to return to him. Even if I die in this state, you will never take that from me.”

“When next you sleep, you may awaken to find him long dead, my human host,” Amaunet cautioned with a dark, heavy feeling pressing into Sha're's consciousness that was like the wicked, evil shadow of the concern she felt for the boy.

\- - -

Jack didn't think of himself as a patient man, most of the time. But he tried not to be gruff, obtrusive, or anything of that nature when he approached Daniel after the third day of watching his eyes get a little more strained, a little more tired at the edges, and a little more hollow. It was a spooky look, and with the spooky young women hanging around the base – and a bad experience or two with those in the past – he knew that someone had to say something. He came to the doorway of Daniel's office and cleared his throat.

“Daniel,” he said, when he grew a little impatient. He had never promised he was patient.

Daniel visibly started a little, sighed, and turned to look at Jack. His face was even further washed out by the bluish light that came from the computer monitor.

“Yes?” Daniel asked, obviously a little strained. He also wasn't very patient, no matter what he might throw up to Jack in an argument. Jack wasn't interested in an argument, so much, though. He approached Daniel and found a place to sit. He had to pick up a tagged artifact to do it, but he examined it with careful, delicate interest such that Daniel couldn't even scold him.

“I just thought I'd come check on you,” he remarked, as if he were bored with the idea in favor of the little alien trinket he had picked up.

“I'm fine,” Daniel said, so perfectly that it was obviously a lie, even if Daniel didn't think so.

“You haven't been _fine_ in a while,” Jack argued. Then he leaned a little closer, lowering the object in his hands to his lap. He watched Daniel's face and spoke in little more than a whisper. “And even if you were, you haven't really been since that Clara started talking to you.”

“Clara is a very nice woman in a very... tragic situation,” Daniel insisted. “If I'm anything, it's _empathetic—_ ” he said, rolling his eyes and clicking his tongue so that Jack knew he was probably about to insult him to deflect negative attention from himself.

“So am I. And look, I care enough about those girls, but I'm worried about _you_ ,” Jack said, cutting off Daniel's go-to excuse for refusing to think that Jack could think when it was inconvenient to whatever story he had cooked up in his head.

“Me? Why me?” Daniel asked, weary and deep-breathed.

“Because,” Jack all but hissed, “I think you're thinking something that might not be possible. And even if it is possible, it might be dangerous and not give you back... what you want, at all.”

Daniel looked away. He made a few keystrokes on the keyboard in front of him. He lapsed into ignoring Jack for several minutes, but Jack just leaned back and waited. He didn't offer to leave. Finally, Daniel looked back at him, and he perked up, attentive and expectant.

“It isn't about what I want,” Daniel replied, at last.

“It's not,” Jack said, dubious and prompting at once. He hoped it was more the latter than the former. He delicately put down the tagged artifact on a shelf, clearing his hands, his focus, of anything but whatever Daniel was thinking through out loud. That was all he wanted, really.

“No, it's not,” Daniel said. He met Jack's eyes, determined, but then he was looking past his shoulder, at the wall maybe, or at nothing. “It's not,” he repeated, “because... when I went to Abydos, I never meant to stay. I never meant... to meet her, or to get caught up in anything bigger than me. I just... I just wanted a paycheck, really. Not to be homeless. But I found a home there. And for a while, it was the only place I could imagine growing old, but... now... sometimes it feels like it was a dream. No matter how many times I go through the Gate, no matter how much I hope and look for her, every day it seems less and less likely that we're going to just _go back_ , that we'll pick up... where we were. No, I... it doesn't matter. It's not about what I want. I would go back to that life in a heartbeat, Jack. No matter what I've got here, no matter how well I... cope, I love her. I love her family. I love... the way they live their lives, how they appreciate what they have and what they can do in a way that we're too spoiled and naïve to understand. I would... but... it's not... about me. If... If I had to give up... everything I know about her, everything I love about her, or the fact that there is so much more I know about human life now, I would. Because whatever... importance this program holds, it could do it without me. It could... go on. And so could she.”

Quite abruptly, Daniel stopped speaking. Jack waited to see if there was more forthcoming. He took the time to digest all of it, but he couldn't think of a damn thing that was the _right_ thing to say to all of that. He leaned forward, changing his posture as if it might shift the weight on his mind.

“Yeah,” he said, eventually.

Daniel caught a bitter laugh before he answered him.

“Yeah,” he echoed. “Yeah... that's... it,” he mumbled.

“I listened,” Jack promised him, to let him know he hadn't wasted his time. “It's just... hell, there's nothing I can say to that. Anything I could try would be insulting.”

“Maybe it'd help,” Daniel said, the closest thing his hollowed-out tone could come to wry. “You're good at insulting.”

“And you're good at going through the motions when you know something's changed,” Jack grumbled.

Daniel blinked, widened his eyes just barely, for a second, and then shrugged.

“Yeah, I am,” he conceded.

Jack shrugged in turn and sat up straighter again, thinking that he might get up to stretch his legs, to give Daniel some breathing room, or to offer to help take his mind off things that they couldn't change, here and now, if he could think of anything.

“I guess you gotta be,” he said, not quite bracing his weight on Daniel's shoulder as he took hold of it and stood in the same movement.

“Jack, why're you here?” Daniel asked quietly, looking down at his own lap.

“I'm here 'cause I'm worried about you. Because I know she was a hell of a woman, and—”

“Is,” Daniel insisted.

“Is,” Jack agreed, because somewhere, out there, in there, she probably was. “It's because I know she's a hell of a woman, that she'll fight to the last inch of her sanity if she can. But I... know that... anyone who loves you, they want you to be able to go on... with or without them. Right?” he asked, retreating back into a part of his mind that was still hard to look in the eye.

“Exactly,” Daniel said softly, turning to crane his neck to look up at Jack. “It goes both ways. The only thing... I've been thinking about... since we met them – met Clara – is that... if... there was a way she could go on with her life, with or without me, that I'd... have to accept it. I just want her to be free. She fought to be free, and... I'd like to think there's freedom for her, other than in death. Even if it's... freedom from me.”

Jack sighed. He really didn't know what to do. Everything Daniel was saying hit like an indirect punch to his abdomen. Daniel was only saying things that were true, or which were true for him, and it didn't matter if there were a whole lot of could-have-been's and can-never-be's in there. Daniel didn't seem to be ready to stand up, so Jack just looked down at the top of his head and tried to figure out what he could do – to anchor himself, to let Daniel know that he was also a hell of a person – one that burned quietly and had an uncanny ability to _refuse_ in a way that was so frustrating, so admirable, and so... him. With one hand still braced on Daniel's shoulder, he adjusted himself so he stood behind him, and he let the other hand mirror it. He couldn't let it linger long – couldn't – because he didn't know how to explain it, but for a few moments he just held him at both his shoulders, keeping him still in his seat as if it offered some protection.

“Whatever happens, she's not gonna be free of you. And... whatever happens, that's a good thing,” he promised. He kind of knew these things from experience.

 

 


End file.
